indie game

One of the first games you learn when you’re a kid is checkers. It’s pretty simple. Third-graders organize checker tournaments to see who the best person is. Well, Quadradius is the 21st Century version of that game.

It’s played on the Web. It has a bit of strategy and luck to it. It’s a fun game that folks can play head to head. The Boston Globe takes a look at Jimmi Heiserman and Brad Kayal , the guys behind the game, and details its history. If you can stand condescending lines like — “For the online video game community, an experience that incorporates the trinity of robots, gambling, and magic powers covers all the bases.” — it’s a good read.

The game itself is pretty fun. I can see the checker comparision. Players have to keep moving the pieces until they reach a point where they have to start attacking. The big difference is the powers that players can get and how fans use them. There’s a bit of strategy in the Quadradius.

Looking a lot like Zack Snyder’s300, Achilles is a simplistic action game with a fair bit of violence. Players take on the role of Achilles, and they swipe, kick and hurl spears at enemies.

Combat isn’t complicated. At first, enemies can be easy to clear. All you have to do is move with W,A,S,D keys and attack with the T and Y keys. One slash will send their heads flying or they could press forward and T to toss a spear in an enemies direction. Picking up weapons and blocking are done by pressing S.

Later in the game, fighting becomes more complicated. Fans have to block arrows and counterattack with a kick.

The music isn’t so bad, but the backgrounds is noticeably bland. There are lots of browns and beige. Overall, it’s your average Web game.
Play time: About 10 minutes per level. There are five levels with three stages each level.

From the screenshots, Henry Hatsworth in the Puzzling Adventure seems confusing. The puzzle-platformer appears to be two games at once. On the top screen, there’s a platformer. At the bottom, there’s a match-three puzzle game similar to Bejeweled.

But somehow designer Kyle Gray manages to fuse the two genres together. In Henry Hatsworth, players control the titular character. The controls are fairly standard. He moves with the directional pad. He can strike enemies in different directions using the Y button. He can shoot them from a far by pressing the A button. Players jump across chasms and onto platforms with the B button.

Where the game becomes interesting is when players hit the X button. This freezes the top screen and moves the action below. The game becomes a puzzle as players have to match three blocks by moving them horizontally.

Players can use the buttons or they can fiddle with the stylus. Gray, the developer, was an expert and his fingers moved so fast that the puzzle-solving seemed instant. But speed is necessary in this part of the game because the blocks are actually Hatsworth’s fallen foes.

In the game, whenever Hatsworth defeats an enemy he falls into the puzzle as a piece. The screen inches up from the bottom, and if the blocks reach high enough, these enemies are resurrected and come back to haunt Hatsworth.

There’s nothing fancy about Planet Platformer other than the fact that it takes place on a circular level. Players control a stick figure who jumps around a mazelike level grabbing gold stars. The object of each stage is to capture them all to advance.

After a couple of playthroughs, the platformer emerges into something of a puzzle game. Players have to figure out how to reach higher areas with the quirky gravity and level design. On top of that, Planet Platformer’s soundtrack is retro with sound effects straight from Super Mario Bros.

For the uninitiated, the game is unforgiving. In other words, it has its difficult moments. Make a mistake and misjudge a jump and players will have to start the game over from the beginning. But overall, the level design and concept is good.

Yeah, the only thing I understand from the title is the word “guitar” but the rest of the game is understandable. Just look at the picture. Super Crazy Guitar Maniac Deluxe 2 is a Guitar Hero rip-off. But it’s done fairly well.

The game has that old arcade vibe with a simple stick figure art-style. It’s easy to get into. The fret board uses the arrow keys and some letters. It’s mostly the FPS variety.

Players are able to unlock certain new guitars by going through a couple of songs. But the most amazing thing is that the casual game works off real music. I don’t know how they did it, but it’s a nice trick to pull off over the InterWebs. And the best part is that music ain’t half bad.